Tag Archives: Viktor

One essential element to the presentation of this blog is what we in the journalism business call “art”. Who wants to just read thousands of words of text without some photos to wash it down?

I watch basically every show I review on my iMac and, while taking notes, snap as many screenshots as humanly possible. It’s a hit-or-miss proposition, but often the hits are pretty good. There were enough hits during NXT Takeover 2 (full review here) that they didn’t all fit into the piece.

As a result, here’s a gallery! As always with NXT, all screencaps are taken directly from the WWE Network.

The Lucha Dragons, Sin Cara and Kalisto, led off the night as challengers for The Ascension’s NXT Tag Team Championship.Viktor brought the intensity and high-impact offense expected of The Ascension. But two days after a solid win on Main Event, he was pinned to drop the NXT Tag Team Championship belts he and Konnor held for nearly a year.

The Lucha Dragons earned the upset win and celebrate with the NXT Tag Team straps.

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CJ Parker faced a mystery opponent …… whom ended up being Baron Corbin. Corbin made some noise with just a couple moves in his 30-second win.

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Big Cass signals the start of the comic relief portion of the program, featuring Enzo Amore and The Legionnaires.Sylvester LeFort lost his hair vs. hair match with Enzo Amore, and thought he would lose his hair. But he did what any heel Frenchman would do — bail and make his partner, Marcus Louis, take the stipulation-fulfilling punishment.

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This man entered Takeover as Kenta …… and left as Hideo Itami, with an upper hand on The Ascension to boot.

… with the most gorgeous entrance.Sami Zayn put on another valiant effort to no avail. He’s 0-3 in NXT special events, but averaging about 4.83 stars per match.On Sept. 11, 2014, Tyson Kidd was the top heel on WWE’s best in-ring show. Fact.Pre-midlife crisis for Tyson Kidd? Or just a way to drown out the “Nattie’s husband” chants?A very confident (almost cocky) Adrian Neville poses with the NXT Championship as Sami Zayn waits.Adrian Neville celebrates after retaining the NXT Championship.Adrian Neville holds his NXT Championship belt after pinning Tyson Kidd in a 24-minute, 5-star fatal 4-way match. Sami Zayn couldn’t get back into the ring quickly enough to make the save.

Every once in a while, the Real World Champ will discuss subjects that don’t exactly fit into a current show or hot topic, but generally are worth discussing in the world of professional wrestling. It’s called the State of Pro Wrestling, and this is the second installment. The first is here.

The best part of the WWE Network is accessing its vault of prior events, especially pay-per-views from WWF/WWE, ECW and my personal favorite, World Championship Wrestling. WCW set the biggest boom period of professional wrestling in motion with the New World Order in 1996, but the company had to find ways to appeal to not only those drawn to star power, but also hardcore fans who wanted to see some of the best technical wrestling in the world.

Enter the cruiserweights.

ECW introduced a bit of the lucha libre and Japanese styles to the U.S., using the likes of Eddie Guerrero, Chris Jericho, Dean Malenko, Rey Misterio Jr. and, yes, Chris Benoit. All were smaller than the WWF template of the mid-1990s, and they put on technical masterpieces. These men didn’t stay long in ECW before Eric Bischoff saw them as a way to lead off WCW Monday Nitro.

When I got back into wrestling in the spring and summer of 1998, I came to WCW for the marquee stars of my childhood and the nWo. I stayed for the little guys — some of whom flew around like superheroes in the lucha libre style, and others who could stretch you every which way until you couldn’t take it anymore.

This topic came up on Twitter (major props to @NewAgeInsiders and new follower @JAMIEGotDatBOMB for the inspiration), and the names flying around brought back some of my fondest memories. There were the aforementioned. There was Billy Kidman, the greasy worker of Raven’s Flock who made the Shooting Star Press one of my favorite finishers. There was Juventud Guerrera, who could knock you out with the Juvi Driver or mesmerize you with the 450. There was Ultimo Dragon, with the cool mask and that vicious Dragon Sleeper. There were other smaller Americans like Lenny Lane and Sean Waltman, who had Cruiserweight and U.S. Championship runs as Syxx. There were some more, shall we say, unorthodox guys like Disco Inferno and Alex Wright. There even were jobbers like Kaz Hayashi, and there were plenty more luchadors like Psicosis, El Dandy and the Chairman of WCW, La Parka.

Toward the end, there were these guys.

Oh, like I was going to get through a WCW post without mentioning 3 Count. Please.

Anyway, I watched these guys for the wrestling, the main-event guys for the promos, and I has a happy viewer for 3 hours every Monday night. All this nostalgia begged one question …

What if WWE revived the cruiserweight division?

SmackDown carried cruiserweights for a decent amount of the 2000s, after it acquired WCW and its younger, somewhat smaller talent, and it thrived until, for some reason, Hornswoggle won the championship in 2007. It’s been retired since.

In that time frame, there weren’t many credible wrestlers on the main roster who were under 225 pounds, since many of those who fit the criteria were phased out. But we’ve moved from a stage where guys like Edge and Randy Orton are on the small end of average at 240 to one where a 218-pound C.M. Punk was WWE Champion for 434 days, and 210 (if that)-pound Daniel Bryan likely will be WWE World Heavyweight Champion at 10:45 p.m. EDT on April 6. Guys like Dolph Ziggler and Kofi Kingston, who don’t seem all that small, easily would be cruiserweights.

In fact, here’s all the eligible talent via WWE.com as of April 5, besides Christian (likely to retire), Punk (likely retired) and Los Matadores (no weights listed), from lightest to heaviest.

Evan Bourne, 165 pounds

Rey Mysterio, 175

Tyson Kidd, 195

Hunico/Sin Cara, 205

Xavier Woods, 205

Daniel Bryan, 210

Yoshi Tatsu, 211

Kofi Kingston, 212

Dolph Ziggler, 213

Justin Gabriel, 213

Zack Ryder, 214

Heath Slater, 216

Seth Rollins, 217

Cody Rhodes, 220

The Miz, 220

R-Truth, 220

Jinder Mahal, 222

Curt Hawkins, 223

Dean Ambrose, 225

That’s a 19-man division ranging from main-event-caliber talent to low- to midcard guys, with enough contrasting styles to make it interesting. Some guys, like Slater and Mahal seem to be as part of 3MB, are likely destined in the current WWE construct to be jobbers. But they theoretically could be contenders in this division. Ryder, Miz and Truth could get new life with something to actually compete for. Imagine the high-flying action of Bourne, Kidd and Gabriel. Imagine WWE taking the kid gloves off Bryan (on a brief sabbatical from the main event in this case) and Rollins for 20 minutes. Imagine guys like Ziggler, Rhodes and Ambrose getting fresh in-ring chances to show off their workrate. This could work, and this could be fun.

The Intercontinental and United States championships aren’t being used anyway. Hell, why not just have Ambrose show up with a different belt when The Shield finishes doing its thing and start a seamless transition?

Let me guess, you don’t like the roster. Too many jobbers and stale guys, not enough freshness and excitement. Well you know who else is under 225? ALMOST EVERYBODY RELEVANT ON NXT.

Adam Rose, 221

NXT Champion Adrian Neville, 194

Aiden English, 215

C.J. Parker, 220

Corey Graves, 208

Sami Zayn, 192

Tyler Breeze, 195

NXT Tag Team Champion Viktor, 219

And those are just the guys who have competed on the show since the Network launched.

At least seven of those eight men have either the talent or persona deserving of a spot at the highest level. (I’m not sold on Parker.) Neville, Zayn and Graves are three of NXT’s best, and even with Bryan on the verge of being the company’s top man, they’re probably “too small to make an impact”. Why not give them a great chance of succeeding in a transition from NXT to the main roster?

Can you seriously say Sami Zayn and Corey Graves’ main event this week couldn’t be on the first hour of SmackDown? Are you telling me Neville and Ambrose, or Neville and Rollins, or Neville and Rhodes, couldn’t tear down the house? Like fans wouldn’t mark the hell out for Neville’s Red Arrow or the inward 450?

GIF from properlypromoted.com

Like they wouldn’t be thoroughly entertained by a Tyler Breeze-Dashing Cody Rhodes “Not The Face” Match? Come on.

Triple H is developing these fresh faces for something, and they certainly don’t fit the 6-foot-4, 255-pound mold his chiseled physique once made. Why not ease the transition, give them a niche, and let them do something besides “pay their dues” jobbing for Alberto Del Rio or Sheamus in boring 5-minute filler bouts?

I miss the cruiserweights. Here’s a great way to bring them back in full force.